


Drawn to the Blood

by theoriginofloves (madelinedrive)



Category: IT - Stephen King
Genre: Blood, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-07
Updated: 2019-09-07
Packaged: 2020-10-11 16:43:40
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,489
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20549393
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/madelinedrive/pseuds/theoriginofloves
Summary: After the kids defeat Pennywise, they make an oath to look out for each other, to protect one another.But something isn't sitting right with Eddie and he just can't figure out why.





	Drawn to the Blood

**Author's Note:**

> I wrote this after seeing IT: Chapter One in the theater the night before IT: Chapter Two would be released. Now that IT: Chapter Two is out and ruined my life, I needed some sort of catharsis for all this pent up emotion and if I didn't post this little ficlet, it would turn into a 50K+ multi-chapter and I'm not sure I'm emotionally capable of putting myself through that...
> 
> Anyway, hope you enjoy!

I was sporting a cast because my fucking arm had been broken by a demonic creature hellbent on killing me and my friends. 

Typical summer shit. 

And after we killed it we stood on the edge of the woods and listened to our little ringleader give a speech about how we needed to protect each other. 

Typical Bill shit. 

He picked up a piece of glass and sliced his palm open, which I thought was a little dramatic, but no one said anything so I didn’t either. Then he sliced each of our left hands open one by one, and even though communicable blood diseases were running rampant that year, I let him slice my hand with the blood-stained glass too. 

We held hands and thought about everything that we had been through in the last couple months. I pressed my stinging open wound against Mike’s smooth palm and felt the slippery warmth of my blood coat his skin. 

Then I looked to my right hand and watched Richie’s blood soak through the clean white slate of the inside of my cast. I couldn’t feel the warmth of it, no liquid coating the smooth skin underneath. 

It was like I was missing something. 

Later that night, I sat on my bed and looked at my hands — the left with a jarring gash torn through it and the right decorated with an abstract blossom of Richie’s blood on white plaster. 

I didn’t know why, but I lifted my right hand and pressed the red-stained curve of the cast to my cheek. I think I expected it to be warm, like I would feel that liquid smooth heat cascading down my skin. And when it wasn’t, when it just felt cold and slightly damp, I was disappointed. 

I tried to shake the feeling, tried to think about anything else, but the more I tried to ignore it the more the palm of my hand tingled from underneath layers of plaster. 

A different Eddie would have had the sense to let it go, no matter how much it bothered him. Eddie from six months ago would have no problem burying that feeling under a laundry list of other more pressing concerns. But after the summer we’d been through, after finally standing up to my mom, I was feeling a level of ease that I’d never known before. 

The idea came to me and before I could think of all the things that could go wrong, I was up and out of bed. I slipped on a jacket and threw open my window, shimmying out and down the side of the house. The cast added a degree of difficulty, but I managed to get to the ground without breaking another bone in the process. 

Then I was on my bike cruising down the middle of the dark street with the chill wind against my face and I felt so free that I thought I might scream! I’d never snuck out before, I’d never been allowed on the streets after dark. Now the night was calling me somewhere and I let it guide me. 

To the end of Richie’s driveway. 

I dropped my bike on the lawn, circled around the side of the house. Every window in the house was dark but I knew which one I was looking for. When I found it, I stood under the second story window, looking up as the moonlight glistened off the glass. 

“Richie!”

It came out as a whisper and there was no way it could be heard from the second floor. I dropped down to run my hands through the grass hurriedly, feeling for a rock or stick to throw. I found a pebble and hurled it up at the glass without a second thought. 

The sound was a sharp tick and I dropped back down to search for another projectile before I heard the window slide open. 

“Jesus Christ, what the fuck.” The words were muted from the distance, but they made me smile. When I looked up into the flashlight beam glaring down at me, I was greeted with another slew of hushed swear words, followed by a whisper, “What are you doing here, Eddie?” 

I thought about the question for a moment. It hadn’t occurred to me that I would need a reason. 

“I don’t know,” I admitted. I glanced down at the cast, the delicate shape of Richie’s dried blood in my hand, thinking that might jog some reasoning from the recesses of my brain. 

“I think — I just wanted to see you.” 

When I looked back up, Richie was unusually silent, just staring back at me like he was trying to figure out if I was real or one of those waking nightmares we’d all been prone to over the last several months. 

“Hold on. I’m coming down,” he finally whispered back. 

His window slid shut and I only counted to twelve before he was bursting out of the back door of his house. He strode over quickly, looking me up and down. 

“Is everything okay? Are you okay?” 

I was surprised by his questions, as I always was when Richie showed any ounce of sincerity. His face was shrouded in worry and for a second it seemed like he was going to reach out to grab my shoulders. 

“Everything’s fine, I think. I was just sitting at home and,” I shrugged. That was the end of the story, at least as far as I could decipher it. It was hard to translate that wanting feeling, that missing something, so I didn’t try. 

“Fucking hell, you scared me.” Richie’s shoulders finally seemed to relax, though he looked me up and down again, “You’re not usually the one sneaking out to see me. I thought something was wrong.” 

I just nodded. The few times this had happened before, it had been Richie crawling through my window, crashing around my bedroom and yammering out his usual comedy routines so loudly that I was always sure it would wake my mother. It never did, though. 

My eyes went to his left hand and I reached for it, flipping it over to expose his palm. Where mine had stopped bleeding, because I had treated and wrapped it when I’d gotten home, Richie’s was mangled and weepy, parts of the long cut sealed and others beading up with blood trying to burst through. 

“I keep bumping it into shit and splitting it open,” he huffed, shaking his head and adding, “When I die from an infection, that’ll really show Bill, huh?” 

I knew how I was supposed to respond, to quip back about the serious chances that he could actually get an infection and get really sick, but I didn’t. 

Instead, I pressed his bleeding palm to my cheek and closed my eyes. It wasn’t the same as when Bill had dragged the glass over our skin before, the blood was not pouring itself down my face, but it felt like what I was looking for. It was warm and tender and the nagging feeling in the pit of my stomach finally ceased.

I expected Richie to crack a joke, to pull his hand back away from me, but he didn’t. 

“This summer really fucked us up, didn’t it Eds?” 

I laughed anyway. 

When I opened my eyes, I was still holding his hand against my cheek with mine. I nodded. 

“I don’t want to go home,” I said, because I didn’t. 

The tips of his fingers pressed into my face just slightly as he shook his head, “I don’t blame you. Your mom’s a certified wackjob.” 

His voice was still sincere. I nodded. 

“You can stay here,” he offered, shrugging one shoulder. “You know my mom likes you better than she likes me anyway.” 

I think he probably meant that I could stay the night, but I would have stayed with Richie at his house for as long as he’d let me. As annoying as he could be, as much of a pain in the ass as he insisted on being, I always felt the most comfortable around him. I knew he was always looking out for me and I hoped that he knew I was always looking out for him too.

“Yeah, okay. Thanks Rich,” I smiled, finally letting go of his hand. 

We fell asleep on his bedroom floor facing each other, even though I told Richie he could sleep in his own bed if he wanted to. 

We fell asleep with our torn up palms clasping each other’s, even though when we woke up in the morning we argued about who had initiated it for half an hour before admitting that maybe it didn't matter. 

We fell asleep holding hands on Richie's bedroom floor for the last few nights of summer before I finally had to go home, before school started again, before we had to pretend that everything hadn't changed.


End file.
